Piedmont added one more case to its COVID numbers in recent days, ticking up from 181 to 182 this week. At least one student at PHS is reported to have tested positive recently, resulting in some students having to quarantine until May 26, according to an email sent Wednesday night to affected PHS families by the PHS principal and the district nurses, who have started contact tracing.
12- to 15-year-olds line up for the vaccine
Meanwhile, many Piedmont families rushed to snag vaccination appointments for their 12- to 15-year-olds this week after they became eligible for the Pfizer vaccine starting Thursday, May 13. CVS and Walgreens pharmacies started booking appointments on Wednesday, and other sites such as MyTurnCa (directing users to Curative’s mass vaccination site in Berkeley/Albany) and Children’s Hospital followed suit shortly thereafter. Piedmont families reported making appointments everywhere from Concord and San Francisco to pharmacies nearby, having success with walk-ins as well.
Parents who took their teens to the Curative site near Albany Bulb on Thursday (including one Exedra editor), found themselves stuck in a slow-moving line of cars even with appointments, as the site saw a surge in demand that day. Waits between one and two hours were the norm that afternoon.
“That was awful. We were in the car line for two hours. It was a mad rush of all of Albany and Berkeley to get their kids vaccinated,” said Tracy Hatamiya, the parent of kids ages 15 and 13.
A Curative customer service representative told the Exedra that “things got a little crazy” that first day and that the company was scrambling to hire the extra personnel needed to accommodate the increased demand. The combination of accepting walk-ins and 12-15 year-olds on the first day overwhelmed the staff, even as pharmacies elsewhere appeared ready for the demand.
Piedmont’s vaccination rate for those 16 and over remains the highest in Alameda County at more than 95 percent having received a first dose as of May 14 and 74 percent the second.